A Spark of Inspiration-- The Muppet Studios

Rendering for Disney-MGM Studios' Muppet Studios

Let me start off by saying, I have absolutly no idea if what I'm about to tell you is true. It's an assumption (one that makes complete and total sense to me, a self-educated history nut of Walt Disney World) so if there's someone out there in Internet-land reading this right now, who knows that I'm completely and totally false, please let me know, #1 because I'm totally interested in what it is, and #2 because I want to make sure I give my readers accurate info. All of that said, I'm pretty sure the above concept art is a rendering for what would have been built back in the Streets of America section of Disney's Hollywood Studios had Jim Henson not passed away. I've never seen this image anywhere on the web before, and I'm really excited to be the first (that I know of) to bring this amazing piece of work to you! Starting from the right side of the picture, you'll see something that looks almost identical to the current "Muppet Vision 3-D" building (with a few tweaks and changes made). Moving to the center of the image, way, way, way in the back, is what I would assume to be the entrance to the most exciting attraction never built, "The Great Muppet Movie Ride", which would have been a parody of DHS' "The Great Movie Ride", with Muppet characters renacting scenes from classic films such as Peter Pan and Frankenstein. Finally, on the far left is a building with a Sweedish Chef ballon flying above with a sign ontop that reads, "The Sweedish Chef's Video Cooking School Restaurant". I think its safe to say this one's probably a restaurant, but how cool would it have been if this was an attraction along the lines of "Turtle Talk", with the Sweedish Chef teaching guests how to make cookies or something along those lines. Obviously this is a smidge on the unrealistic side, as one can imagine that the costs of providing even a portion of guests with the supplies to make cookies every single day continuously would be quite high. Even so, I think it's very safe to say that this area would've been hillarious and filled with fun and whimsical adventures for everyone. Perhaps with the release of Disney's first theatrical Muppet film, The Muppets, we'll see a resurgance in Muppet popularity and this area may come to pass in the future.